Andrea Leadsom

Dame Andrea Jacqueline Leadsom (' Salmon'''; born 13 May 1963) is a British politician serving as Member of Parliament (MP) for South Northamptonshire since 2010.

A member of the Conservative Party, she has served as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Public Health, Start for Life and Primary Care since November 2023.

Leadsom was born in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire in 1963.

After graduating with a degree in political science at the University of Warwick, she began a career in finance including working as Institutional Banking Director at Barclays, and later as Senior Investment Officer and Head of Corporate Governance at Invesco Perpetual.

Leadsom was born on 13 May 1963 in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, the daughter of Richard and Judy Salmon (née Kitchin).

She attended Tonbridge Girls' Grammar School, then read Political Science at the University of Warwick.

After graduation, Leadsom began a career in the financial sector as a debt trader for Barclays de Zoete Wedd, then the investment bank division of Barclays Bank.

For Barclays itself, she served as Deputy Director in the Financial Institutions team from 1993; this involved the maintenance of contractual relationships with other banks.

In this role, she said she was given a "ringside seat" in the collapse of Barings Bank.

Leadsom clashed with the head of Barclays Investments who tried to persuade her to return to full-time work soon after a pregnancy, and she left the company in 1997.

From 1997 to 1999, Leadsom served as Managing Director of De Putron Fund Management (DPFM).

In 1998 she was promoted to board director for marketing.

Leadsom was Head of Corporate Governance and a Senior Investment Officer at Invesco Perpetual from 1999 to 2009.

Her role was to work (sometimes part-time) on "special projects", mostly for the Chief Investment Officer, which included negotiating pay terms for senior fund managers.

Towards the end of her time, she advised on a number of governance issues, but she had no-one reporting to her in either role.

Leadsom never claimed to have personally been a fund manager, and Bob Yerbury, former Chief Investment Officer at Invesco Perpetual and Leadsom's former manager, dismissed the controversy about how she described her time there and described her as "totally honest".

Leadsom was a Councillor on South Oxfordshire District Council between 2003 and 2007.

She contested the safe Labour seat of Knowsley South constituency in the 2005 general election unsuccessfully and finished in third place, adding just under 1% to the previous vote.

She was subsequently placed on the Conservative A-List and later chosen to represent the newly created seat of South Northamptonshire.

Leadsom was selected to stand as the parliamentary candidate in the newly-created South Northamptonshire constituency in June 2006.

In 2009, ConservativeHome said that she was "defending a notional Conservative majority of 11,356."

She was elected to the House of Commons at the 2010 general election.

At the 2010 general election in May, Leadsom was elected with a majority of more than 20,000.

On entering the House of Commons she was elected as a member of the Treasury Select Committee.

She made her maiden speech on 22 June 2010 during the budget debate, when she spoke of restoring health to the financial sector, drawing from personal experience in financial regulation, particularly with Barings Bank.

Leadsom campaigned for EU reform.

She served as Economic Secretary to the Treasury and City Minister from 2014 to 2015 and Minister of State for Energy from 2015 to 2016.

She previously served as Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs from 2016 to 2017, Leader of the House of Commons from 2017 to 2019 and Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy from 2019 to 2020.

Leadsom has twice run to become Leader of the Conservative Party, in 2016 and 2019.

Leadsom was a prominent member of the Leave campaign during the 2016 referendum on EU membership, and gained standing in referendum TV debates.

On David Cameron's resignation, Leadsom became one of five candidates in the 2016 Conservative Party leadership election.

In the second round of voting by MPs, she came second to Theresa May.

May appointed Leadsom as Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Leadsom served in the May government as Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs from 2016 to 2017.

Following the 2017 general election, Leadsom was appointed Leader of the House of Commons and Lord President of the Council.

On 22 May 2019, she resigned in protest at May's Brexit strategy.

Two days later, May announced her resignation as party leader, taking effect on 7 June.

Leadsom stood as a candidate to succeed May as leader of the Conservative Party in June 2019 but was eliminated in the first round of voting, finishing 8th out of 10 candidates with 11 votes.

Upon the appointment of Boris Johnson as Prime Minister, Leadsom was appointed Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.

She left the Cabinet in the 2020 cabinet reshuffle and remained in the House of Commons as a backbencher until 2023 when she returned to the frontbench as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Public Health, Start for Life and Primary Care.